Say you and a bunch of your friend want to go to a concert together. You need to buy the tickets in one batch to get adjacent seats, so you step up to the plate and throw down your credit card.

You think to yourself, “Boy, I was so generous, they’ll definitely have the appreciation to remember AND the respect to pay me back right away the next time I see them so that I don’t have to awkwardly hound them for the hard earned cash that is rightfully mine.”

Not so fast, bucko.

The problem is that we live in a society where there are monetary exchanges going on multiple times per day for everyone. And at the same time we are overwhelmed by the media, by advertising, by work, and everything else. It’s hard to remember to pay people back. Even if your friends do remember, there will still be a few jerks out there who never intended to pay you back unless you shake it out of them.

So how do you get your money back without looking like a desperate, distrustful, selfish jerk yourself? That is what we are all afraid of, after all. That and the painful awkwardness. Luckily, there are a few web services and mobile apps out there today that can help us do the dirty work.

Venmo

• -One-Time Fees: None
• -Service Fees: None
• -Mobile Apps: Android, iPhone
• -Overview: Venmo is the only peer-to-peer payment system that is completely free. No transaction fees, even for debit and credit card payments (which has to make one wonder how Venmo stays in business and when the catch will come). You link either a credit card or a bank account up to your phone number and the rest is magic. Enjoy Venmo while it’s free, hopefully it stays that way!

Paypal

• -One-Time Fees: None
• -Service Fees: None with bank account, fees with credit card
• -Mobile Apps? Android, iPhone, Blackberry
• -Overview: Paypal has become a bit synonymous with fees. However, that’s not the case with their person-to-person payments service – if your friend has a bank account, that is. You choose how much the person your billing owes you, Paypal emails and/or sends a note to that person’s Facebook wall. That person then logs in to their Paypal account (or creates one) and sends the payment. You choose whether you or they pay any associated credit card fees, but there are no fees bank transfers.

WePay

• -One-Time Fees: None
• -Service Fees: 3.5 percent or $0.50 (whichever is greater) for credit card, $0.50 for ACH Transfer
• -Mobile Apps: N/A
• -Overview: WePay is very similar to PayPal, but with a cleaner, more-intuitive interface and some enhanced features, including the ability to set up ticketing events and donation campaigns with their own unique homepage. You will pay for the added functionality to the tune of $0.50 for ACH bank transfers or 3.5% for credit card fees. One big downside: no mobile functionality, so you cannot bill your friends on the spot – often the best time to do it.

GoPayment

• -One-Time Fees: None
• -Service Fees: 2.7 percent per transaction if you use the free card swipe reader, 3.7 percent for manual entries. For those accepting lots of transactions, there’s a pricing plan.
• -Mobile Apps: Available for iPhone, Android, iPad and Blackberry.
• -Overview: Intuit (the owner of Mint.com) has a suite of payment-processing products, including GoPayment, an easy-to-use mobile app and card reader that’s appropriate for either small business or individual use (even Girl Scouts have used it to take payment for their cookie sales).  Since there’s no contract or fee for the card reader, it’s a good option for people who may only need to take payments on an occasional basis.

Square

• -One-Time Fees: None
• -Service Fees: 2.75 percent with reader, 3.75 percent + ) $0.15 per transaction when card is entered manually.
• -Mobile Apps: Android, iPhone
• -Overview: Square is positioning themselves for business use, however, their service could be used for person-to-person payments as well. You get mailed a free card reader that you plug in to your phone, after signing up for the service (which is free). From there, it’s a flat 2.75 percent fee for collecting the payment via the reader. If you enter a card number manually, it is 3.75 percent plus $0.15 per transaction. A bit steep, if you ask me, but it is an alternative to get people to pay right on the spot what they owe you if they haven’t got cash or a check. If you want to be a real stickler with your friends, just add on the service fees on top of what they owe you!

Share-A-Bill

• -One-Time Fees: $3.99
• -Service Fees: None
• -Mobile Apps: iPhone
• -Overview: Whereas all of the other services on this list are ways to actually collect payment, Share-A-Bill is a little more subtle. It’s positioned more as a travel app that allows you to expense out all shared costs, work in currency exchange (for traveling), figure out who owes what, and then email out a report afterwards. It is not a payment collection service, on its own. If you have good trust with your friends, that might not be a bad thing. Unfortunately, it’s only available as an iPhone app at this point.

Looking for other great personal finance apps? Check out this list of the best free financial calculator apps or best Android personal finance apps. And, you can always download the Mint Android and iPhone apps for free.

G.E. Miller is the author of 20somethingfinance.com ñ recently voted as the best money blog for twenty-somethings by Kiplinger. Financial independence is his goal and passion.

Have a loved one who spends most of their waking hours on their smartphone device? It’s not too late to give them a little something extra this holiday season – in the form of a great app. In fact, you can even wait until the special day that you are exchanging gifts to download the app with them and pay for it. Consider it your get out of jail free card if you’ve waited until the last minute to shop.

Whether they primarily use an iPhone, iPad, or an Android device, some of the best apps are extremely affordable.

There are, of course, plenty of great apps that are free. But giving someone a free app for a holiday? Come on. Not even Scrooge McDuck would do that.

(Just in case, though, check out our picks of the best free financial calculator apps, best iPad personal finance apps and the best Android personal finance apps.)

Here, we’ve highlighted some of the best paid apps for the iPhone, iPad, and Android in 2010. Since games make up such a huge share of smartphone app purchases and simultaneously make a great gift, we’ll cover a great game app for each platform in addition to a non-game app.

Best iPhone Gift Apps

Game App. – Plants vs. Zombies ($2.99)

Angry Birds was the obvious choice here as the #1 paid app on iPhone, but with good odds that your gift receiver already has it, we had to switch it up a bit. Plants vs. Zombies, from developer PopCap Games, was recently chosen by Apple to be the best iPhone gaming app of 2010. Users seem to agree. The app has over 28,000 reviews, with an average of 4.5 out of 5 stars from a very critical user base.

PopCap describes the game as “A mob of fun-loving zombies is about to invade your home. Use your arsenal of 49 zombie-zapping plants — peashooters, wall-nuts, cherry bombs and more — to mulchify 26 types of zombies before they break down your door.”

50 levels of plant/zombie mayhem will ensure that your $2.99 keeps them busy for a while.

Non-Game App. – Hipstamatic ($1.99)

Hipstamatic allows you to become an instant ‘Hipsta’ photographer with an iPhone. The Hipstamatic app was voted by Apple as the best non-gaming app of 2010 for the iPhone. In the iTunes store, it has over 5,000 reviews and is rated at 4 out of 5 stars.

Essentially, the basic app gives you a series of lens, films, and flashes to choose from so that you can take some pretty unique and fun camera shots and upload them directly to Facebook or Flickr or email them to friends. All the while, you cut out the middleman (Photoshop) by seeing how the photos look immediately with the settings that you selected.

The basic app comes with 3 different lens, 3 film, and 2 flash settings. Additional gear packs (lens, films, and flashes) can be purchased for as low as $0.99.

Best iPad Gift Apps

Game App: Real Racing HD ($9.99)

Real Racing HD was one of the top 10 selling iPad apps of 2010. It has over 2,000 reviews in the iTunes store, with an average rating of 4 out of 5 stars from users. The iPad is an outstanding platform for interactive gaming, and Real Racing HD is perhaps the most visually stunning game app on the platform. In the latest version, you can even get involved in multi-player gaming.

You use the iPad itself as the steering and breaking device, much like a Wii joystick. It’s the perfect combination of function, graphics, and platform. For $9.99, it’s hard to go wrong. Added bonus: you can play your own music while the game plays, just as if you were driving your own car.

Non-Game App: Pages ($9.99)

Pages is a word processing app developed by Apple. It was the top selling iPad app of 2010. It has over 4,000 reviews and a 4 out of 5 rating in the iTunes store. Not bad for a word processor!

Pages allows you to view and edit Pages ’09 files, Microsoft Word files, and plain text files from Mail, the web, your MobileMe iDisk, a WebDAV service, or your Mac or PC using iTunes File Sharing. Not the most exciting gift in the world, but if it’s the top seller, it’s hard to argue with the functionality.

Best Android Gift Apps

Game App: Robo-Defense ($2.99) – search for ‘Robo Defense’ in the Android Market

The #1 paid game app in the Android marketplace at the moment, Robo Defense has over 250,000 downloads, 33,000 ratings, and a 5 out of 5 star rating. Not bad! Build towers, protect them with guns, 120 addicting levels. What more can you ask for?

Non-Game App: PowerAmp Music Player ($4.99) – search for ‘PowerAmp’ in the Android Market

PowerAmp is presently the #1 most downloaded paid app on Android outside of the gaming niche and is getting rave reviews as the best Android music player app on the market. It has a 5 star rating with over 4,500 reviews. The app features an equalizer with pre-set options, album art grabber (so you don’t have to go out and find it on your own like you do with WinAmp), supports Last.FM, and offers a slick, user-friendly interface. It is a must-have for Androiders who use their phone to listen to music.

Note: To purchase the full version of PowerAmp, you must first install the trial version and then get the paid upgrade.

What are your pics for the best paid iPhone, iPad, and Android apps of the year to give as gifts?

GE Miller is the author of 20somethingfinance.com, recently selected by Kiplinger as the best personal finance blog for twenty-somethings. In a related post, he recently highlighted 7 money saving gift ideas.

Our efforts to be responsible with our personal finances  and the desire or need to shop often clash, so being frugal and educated when hitting the mall or grocery store is essential. That rings especially true these days, when everyone is about to or has just kicked off the holiday shopping season.

Thankfully, a number of shopping apps for iPhone and Android phones seamlessly enhance your shopping experiences with price comparisons, targeted coupons, information, reviews, rewards, and more.

We went searching for the best shopping apps on the market, and keeping in line with Mint.com‘s frugal values, they are all free.

Looking for other great personal finance apps? Check out this list of the best free financial calculator apps, best iPad personal finance apps and the best Android personal finance apps.

Shopkick

Available on: Android (free), iPhone (free)

Potentially the hottest shopping app this holiday season, Shopkick is a rewards app that gives you ‘kickbucks’ for walking into its partner stores, scanning barcodes on specified items, and completing certain actions, which can be combined and unlock bonus rewards points (almost like putting together a puzzle). These reward points can then be redeemed for free gift cards at those stores, iTunes gift cards, or other incentives.

The app is still in its infant stages and its most notable partners at this point are Best Buy, Target, American Eagle, and Macy’s. Will these promotions pay off for Shopkick’s partners to the point that they will want to continue running the incentives or will people game the system and end up not purchasing things? Time will tell, but if more national partners are brought on board, this app could really take off due to its fun factor and uniqueness.

Google Shopper

Available on: Android (free)

Search for a product by image, barcode, voice, or typing what you’re looking for. Once the product is identified, you’ll find a product description, online reviews, price comparisons, local stores that carry the product, and even detailed directions on how to get there. Zero app developers have as much backing to create apps as Google, which is why this app remains free and incredibly functional.

ShopSavvy

Available on: Android (free), iPhone (free)

Not as full-featured as Google Shopper, this is nevertheless the go-to app for barcode scanning for iPhone (where Google Shopper is not yet available). You can scan a barcode, get online price comparisons, see user generated reviews, and then directions to the nearest store that carries the item.

Points Inside

Available on: Android Market (free)  iPhone (free)

How many times have you been lost in a mall or airport, couldn’t find a directory map, and had absolutely no clue where you were or where you needed to get to? Points Inside aims to come to your rescue. It includes interactive maps for over 700 malls and 85 U.S. and international airports that shows you where you are located and where your destination is. Pretty sweet. Check out this list to see if the mall in your area or airport you’ll be flying into is covered.

Grocery IQ

Available on: Android (free), iPhone (free)

This grocery shopping app (created by Coupons.com) takes grocery shopping to the next level. Make grocery lists, scan barcodes of items you frequently buy, sync and share your grocery lists with others (so you don’t double down on the same items as those you live with), and send coupons right to your loyalty card. Having a consistent grocery list for each store you shop at is a fail-safe way to keep your grocery expenses down. Getting targeted coupons on the stuff that you already buy? Even better.

Key Ring Rewards Cards

Available on: Android (free), iPhone (free)

Love loyalty cards but hate having a key-ring that feels like a mini flip book engulfing your pocket? Or maybe you have the bigger versions stuffed into your wallet, which is single-handedly giving your chiropractor job security. You can use this app’s scanner to scan your key ring barcodes (or manually put in the numbers if the scanner doesn’t work). From there, you can simply use your mobile device at checkout as your loyalty card. Also, for those stores that you have a loyalty card with that partner with Cellfire coupons and 33 grocery store chains, the coupons automatically get uploaded to your loyalty card, you can track which coupons you have available.

Which of these apps do you frequently use? And which of your shopping app favorites didn’t make our list?

G.E. Miller is the author of 20somethingfinance.com – recently voted as the best money blog for twenty-somethings by Kiplinger.

(photo: Geoff Livingston)

With all of the enhanced mobile applications on the market today, it can be easy to overlook the basics. When you need to make a decision on important personal finance matters, you could easily check on your current account balances and spending patterns with Mint.com or its iPhone or Android app. But there are times when all you really need is a calculator to crunch the numbers.

It just so happens that those times are usually when you’re out and about: eating, traveling, looking at homes, or at the car dealership and trying to make a decision on financing your next vehicle. (There’s also shopping, of course, but that’s a whole different ball game.)

And then there’s all those other random one-off situations that require a special calculator.

We found the best FREE calculators for each of these scenarios for both Android and iPhone users. If your favorite didn’t make the list, feel free to share in the comments.

Looking for other great personal finance apps? Check out this list of the best iPad personal finance apps and the best Android personal finance apps.

Tipping Calculators

Ever been at a restaurant, but weren’t quite sure how much you should tip? A simple mobile app is the perfect solution to help us come up with a quick calculation so that we don’t embarrass ourselves or the people we’re with (or end up with spit in our food on the next visit).

Android: Tip Calculator

With Tip Calculator, you can type in the number of people, the total bill, a pre-set tip % (or your own). Tip Calculator then calculates the tip amount, and how much each diner owes.

iPhone: QuickTip

QuickTip offers a very simple interface with a slider to change the tip % so you can see the impact that would have on the total tip.

Exchange Rate Calculators

Frequent travelers need to quickly be able to calculate currency conversion to ensure that they are getting the correct amount and a competitive rate on their cash. These apps will help you do just that.

Android: Exchange Rates

Exchange Rates includes an integrated currency calculator, every world currency, multiple currency display, auto sync, and other great free features.

iPhone: Currency Converter

Currency converter updates 180 world currencies daily, and then offers you a simple calculator to do the conversion. Store your most frequently used currencies with this app.

Mortgage Calculators

Perhaps no other calculation will have as big of an impact on your life as this one. It’s important to get accurate numbers and see the big picture of what your mortgage might cost you. If you’re in the real estate or mortgage business, you can benefit from quick calculations to run by your clients while in your office or on the road.

Also, there is no reason that you can’t use these same apps as auto loan calculators. A loan is a loan, and there aren’t really any good ‘auto loan’ specific apps out there to speak of.

Android: Mortgage Calculator

This Android app displays a monthly payment total or the yearly amortization table. Compute your loan with the option of adding additional monthly payments, additional yearly payments, 1-time payments etc. Then chart the results of interest vs principal paid on the loan.

iPhone: CalcsFree Mortgage Calculator

From monthly payments to overall costs, amortization tables, and graphs, this app shows it all.

Random One-Off Situations

Calcmoolator: Available for both Android and iPhone

The number of financial calculators available through the Calcmoolator app is borderline ridiculous (over 50 at last check). Here is a sampling: Auto Lease vs. Buy, Auto Loan Early Payoff, Auto Loan Estimate, Auto Rebate vs Low Interest Financing, CD Calculator, Home Equity vs. Auto Loan, House Rent vs. Buy, Mortgage Affordability, Mortgage Length, Mortgage Payment Estimate, PMI vs 2nd Mortgage, Salary to Hourly Wage, Switch Jobs?, Tip Calculator, What is The Real APR, Work or Get Unemployment?

Calcmoolator started out with a limited selection of calculators available on a free version of the app and an expanded selection on a paid version. It looks as though the app creator has moved to ad supported model and offered all calculators for free in one version of the app now. Good news. Let’s hope they keep it this way.

G.E. Miller is the author of 20somethingfinance.com – recently voted as the best money blog for twenty-somethings by Kiplinger.

Mint.com the best FREE way to manage your money. Get started here!

photo: David Reece

We’re almost at the two year anniversary mark of the stock market crash of 2008.

Dubbed as “the black week,” the week that started on Monday, October 6, saw the Dow Jones Industrial Average close lower in all five trading sessions and lose 18% of it’s value.

But it was a few weeks before that – on September 15 – that the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the Dow’s subsequent 500-point drop (the largest single-day drop since the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks) when the panic surrounding the financial crisis peaked.

Two years later, where do we stand?

The recession, skyrocketing unemployment rate, and general fear around the stability of the U.S. and world’s economy has no doubt changed us. But to what extent? How has our savings, investment, and overall sentiment about our finances changed over the past two years?

Let’s take a look.

Saving Up

As you can see in the graph below, the U.S. personal savings rate has roughly doubled from around 3% in the third quarter of 2008 (right before the market crash), to around 6% in Q2, 2010.

That personal savings rate is six times what it was as recently as 2005, when it hit its lowest level. Today, it is, in fact, the highest that it’s been since the mid 90′s. The savings rate had been in a steady decline since the mid 80′s, when it topped out at about 11%, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis.

Clearly, Americans are saving more. Whether it is out of fear, because of stricter lending guidelines, or a complete shift in consumption habits, we are putting more of our discretionary take-home income into the bank instead of spending it. Since our economy is largely driven by consumer spending, that hasn’t been the best thing for job creation or the stock market, but there are certainly some positive benefits that come from saving, particularly, less debt.

Investing Habits

Dow Jones Industrial Average (October, 2008 – September, 2010)

It’s no secret that investors have shied away from the stock market, and for good reason. The Dow Jones Industrial Average has been hovering around the 10,000 mark most of this year – a level that it first hit back in 1999. That’s right. If you invested all of your money back in 1999, you’ve seen two market crashes, and it’s quite possible that over that 11-year span you didn’t make a dime. And if you started investing somewhere in the middle of that period, it’s very possible you lost a great deal of money.

There is now a heavy distrust in Wall Street and its regulators. And investing behavior is following suit. Since early 2008, equity mutual funds have seen total cash outflows of about $245 billion, according to data from the Investment Company Institute, a mutual fund industry trade group. More conservative bond mutual funds, on the other hand, have seen total inflows of close to $616 billion.

Could the gen-X’ers and gen-Y’ers who lived through these two crashes at ages when they just started dipping their toes into investing in stocks become the lost generation of investors? Only time will tell if either generation regains its trust of the stock market .

Overall Financial Sentiment

Back in May, I ran a few polls on my personal finance blog, 20somethingfinance.com. I asked a few simple questions, and the responses were intriguing.

One of the questions was, “Are you better or worse off financially than you were two years ago?”

The response was definitive:

A total of 91% felt that they were the same or better off financially than before the start of the financial crisis.

Surprised? When you think about it, you shouldn’t be. Gen-X’ers and Gen-Y’ers (the majority of my blog’s readers) have plenty of time to recover economic losses and don’t hold as much savings in the market as older generations. Our losses were somewhat limited in comparison.

I also asked a follow-up question, “How do you feel overall about your finances?”. The results were definitely not in-line with the answers to the previous question.

Here, more than half of respondents said that they were “worried,” or “struggling.”

There are certainly those out there that are struggling mightily at the moment, as the unemployment situation has not improved much since the start of the crisis. Their troubles should not be dismissed.

But why is there such a discrepancy between the reality of our financial situations and how we feel? Perhaps we’re listening to the media and politicians more than we should be.

Americans are saving more and cutting debt at levels that haven’t been seen in almost two decades. That might result in some short-term pain for the economy and job creation, but an economy that is almost entirely dependent on consumer spending is simply not sustainable.

We are re-prioritizing – and, many argue, for the better. Keep working hard, attack your debt, save for emergencies and the future, and drown out the noise of those who want you to feel like things are worse than they really are.

GE Miller is the author of the personal finance blog, 20somethingfinance.com.

photo: Ben Atkin

According to Techcrunch, since the iPad’s release in April the number of iPad apps has grown to over 10,000. That is still dwarfed by the iPhone’s library of 200,000 apps — and growing — but is still pretty impressive for just a few months on the market.

Since the iPad is still in its infant stages, the app store is relatively light on apps with a specific personal finance focus: most still focus on the gaming and reading niches. (Apple, however, says that almost all of its 200,000 iPhone apps are compatible with the iPad, including the Mint.com mobile app. You could also revisit Mint’s list of the top personal finance apps, published back in February. Alternatively, take a look at Apple’s list of money management iPhone apps.)

Still, we were recently able to find seven iPad apps that, if not directly related to personal finance management, at the very least help you find savings in everyday life situations and, as a result, manage your money more successfully.

Staying true to the Mint money-saving spirit, all but one of the apps are free to download (the other costs only $1.99), and none require a subscription.

Zillow – Free

Zillow has established itself as a great starting point for anyone interested in buying or selling a home. You can search by city or zip, find all homes for sale in the area of your interest, as well as comparable home sales. Once you’ve found a home you’re interested in, you can check out what that home sold for in the past and its estimated value, or “Zestimate.” Why does it make a great mobile app? Because it enables you to take your home search on the road with you: once you hunt down homes you are interested in, you can see them in person, and then take a peak at photos taken from inside the home.

Epicurious – Free

The iPad app from Epicurious.com includes over 28,000 tested recipes from magazines such as Bon Appétit and Gourmet, popular cookbooks, top chefs, and leading restaurants. And the iPad size makes it a great fit as a digital cookbook. What makes it a great personal finance app? Cooking at home is a much cheaper and healthier alternative to eating out!

Grocery IQ – Free

GroceryIQ is a mobile app that allows you to make grocery lists, sync and share them with others (so both you and your significant other don’t come home with a gallon of sauerkraut on the same night), scan barcodes, and even find and send coupons right to your loyalty card. Having a consistent grocery list for each store you shop at is a fail-safe way to keep your grocery expenses down.

Bloomberg – Free

If you like keeping up with your portfolio and business news throughout the day, Bloomberg offers a great iPad app to help you do so. The app offers customized news, stock quotes, company descriptions, market leaders/laggers, price charts, market trends analysis, and more.

Trapster – Free

Trapster has over 7 million users who provide information on speed traps, video enforced speed zones, and police check points. Now, we’re not saying you should recklessly speed around with your Trapster app spitting warnings at you. But most of us have been caught slightly over the speed limit at times, just because we weren’t familiar enough with a given area to be on our guard. Just don’t get caught paying too much attention to Trapster while you’re driving around (that kind of defeats the purpose of the app).

Kayak – Free

The Kayak iPad app, in itself, doesn’t offer any groundbreaking new functionality above the iPhone app or Kayak website. However, Kayak offers such a great airfare comparison interface and with the vibrant large-screen iPad display, it packs even more punch onto one screen.

Compoundee HD – Compound Interest Calculator – $1.99

Compoundee HD is a basic, easy-to-use financial calculator that is able to calculate 5 different investment variables on compound interest calculations at a daily, weekly, quarterly, semi-annual, or annual level. You can find out how much an investment will be worth over a period of time and the calculation over email. This app could be extremely useful for real-estate agents and brokers, bankers, and mortgage brokers.

Which iPad personal finance apps make your “best of” list?

GE Miller discusses personal finance topics for young professionals at 20somethingfinance.com.

Three Republican Senators joined 57 Democrats Thursday to get the necessary votes to pass the financial reform bill, soon to be known as the Dodd-Frank Act (in honor of its two originating supporters). It is now headed to President Obama for his signature.

The law is primarily focused on avoiding future systemic banking system failure, the kind of which has pushed us into the largest recession since the Great Depression. Here’s a quick overview of some of the measures put in place to help achieve that goal.

* Volcker Rule will force big banks to sell hedge funds

*New transparency, reporting and capital rules for derivatives

* Liquidation mechanism for big failing banks to minimize market impact

* Combine two bank regulators at the center of the crisis

* Create a council of regulators to watch for systemic risk

* Give shareholders more power in corporate governance and CEO pay

* Audit of the Fed’s emergency and other lending facilities

Those may sound all fine and dandy, but probably come across as being relatively meaningless to the average consumer. That’s where the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, housed in the Federal Reserve, comes in. It is solely devoted to combating consumer abuses in the marketplace.

Here are four of the big changes that you can expect — and their consequences, both intended and unintended.

Credit Scores

The upside: Long before this regulation was passed, you could get three free credit reports from annualcreditreport.com, under federal law. That was not the case with credit scores. You almost always have had to pay for those or sign up for something (credit monitoring) that you probably shouldn’t.

Now, however, if a lender turns down your application for credit because of your credit score, the lender is required to tell you what your credit score is, for free.

The downside: Credit scores, like credit reports, should be free to consumers at least a few times per year. Oh well, maybe next time.

Mortgage Risk

The upside: A former employee of the defunct mortgage company Countrywide Financial, which was gulped up by Bank of America (BAC), once told me “Yeah, we approved everything, often times without even looking at credit history or income. We were making good money, so why not?”

Under the new rules, lenders must verify a borrower’s credit history, income, and employment status, so that we don’t get into the foreclosure mess that companies like Countrywide put us in.

Banks will also be required to hold on to at least 5% of the loans they make instead of selling them to investors. More risk should equate to more precaution if you can’t unload the cancerous loans.

The downside: With tighter requirements, banks are scaling back their risks, which might make it harder for you to get a mortgage. My opinion? If it’s hard for you to get a mortgage, you probably shouldn’t be buying a house.

Credit and debit cards

The upside: Credit card minimums imposed by retailers now cannot exceed $10. Only the Federal Reserve can raise that limit, which theoretically will protect consumers from spending more at the local store or coffee shop just to hit the minimum requirement. (Read more about this here.)

Also, the Fed will have the power to limit interchange fees on debit-card transactions. (Interchange fees are the fees that card issuers, Visa (V) and MasterCard (MA) collect from merchants as a percentage of each transaction.) However, the rule applies only to banks, not to Visa and MasterCard. Banks usually charge stores 1% to 2% for each transation, but retailers say that lower fees could allow them to cut prices and bring on more workers.

The downside: Retailers now legally have the right to require a minimum charge of $10, if they so choose, in order for you to be able to use a credit card. This may be prohibitive if you just want to buy a candy bar, for instance. (On the flip side, the question is whether you really need to be using a credit card to buy a single candy bar, rather than paying the $1 or $2 cash.) Prior to this law, merchants were actually breaking violating their contracts with Visa and MasterCard, which required to accept all transactions regardless of their amount.

Also, an elimination of yet additional bank revenue streams (this time in the form of interchange fees) might lead to introducing fees in other areas – higher interest rates, lower rewards, or the disappearance of ‘free checking’ accounts.

Financial Adviser Disclosures

The upside: Financial advisers must now disclose all fees, any disciplinary actions and potential conflicts of interest, such as commissions. Brokers who sell stocks, bonds, annuities, and other investments have not always been required to make such disclosures, permitting them to act in their or their company’s best interests, and not yours.

The downside: This isn’t a done deal. The SEC has commissioned a six-month study to determine whether average investors are sufficiently protected by the rules already in place or whether something stronger is necessary.

For more details on what the bill aims to accomplish, read Senate Banking Committee Chairman Senator Dodd’s 16-page summary here. Appreciate it: the full bill is rumored to fill 2,232 pages.

GE Miller discusses personal finance topics for young professionals at 20somethingfinance.com.

photo: ansik

In itself, Mint.com is a thorough budget calculator, looking at all of your actual expenses and income and giving you comparisons to allocated budget amounts. But sometimes you just want to run a few hypotheticals based on a potential income or expense increases or decreases as the result of a future event. Or maybe you just want to drill into a very specific situation. That’s where the 10 quick and easy budgeting calculators we’ve outlined below can come in handy.

General Budgeting Calculators

Kiplinger: Kiplinger has a very comprehensive worksheet that lets you project your expenses in a wide range of spending categories (from fixed costs such as housing and car payments to variables like pocket money and your electric bill) and compares them to how much you actually spent.

CNBC: The ‘On the Money’ team has created a helpful budgeting calculator that takes the guesswork out of how you should allocate your take-home income, including savings and spending in various categories. Simply put in your monthly take home pay, and it calculates the rest.

20SomethingFinance: Shameless self-promotion (but for good reason). Over 2 years ago, I created a budgeting spreadsheet that I still use to this day. It includes built-in formulas to calculate total income and expenses and the ability to budget for every month of the year ahead. If you want to save the work you’ve completed, having your own spreadsheet is the way to go.

photo: clevercupcakes

Weddings Budget Calculators

Your Wedding Company: Getting married in the near future? If you aren’t setting aside and keeping tabs on a budget for your big day, you are heading towards a world of debt pain and a rocky financial start to your marriage. This calculator has a pre-set field for just about every wedding expense that you could potentially incur. It includes the ability to see ‘suggested’ budgeting amounts.

The Ritz Carlton: Working backwards, and perhaps more effectively, the RitzCarlton has created a wedding budget calculator that allows you to put in your total budget and the number of guests you plan on inviting, and then giving you a list of how much you should allocate towards each wedding expense.

photo: sleepyneko

Student Budgeting Calculator: Finaid

Looking for a budgeting calculator that factors in all student related income and expenses? Look no further than Finaid’s student budget calculator. Tuitions, books, grants, loans, work study: all are factored in.

Startup Business Calculator: IdeaCafe

Starting a business can include costs that you have planned for– and a whole bunch of costs you probably had not considered. Whether you’re just toying around with the idea of a startup or feel ready to take the plunge, IdeaCafe’s startup business calculator will help you keep your budget on track.

photo: jessicafm

Cost of Raising Children Calculator: WalletPop

Not sure whether you can afford to have children at the moment or add another to your growing family? WalletPop aims to lend some insight with this helpful ‘cost of raising a child’ calculator. It includes pre-set amounts of average expenses in each category.

Budgeting Calculator for Being a Stay-at-Home Parent: WalletPop

WalletPop’s second budget calculator entry to make the list delivers with helping you answer the age-old new parent dilemma: “What is the financial impact of becoming a stay-at-home parent?” The fact that it factors in cost savings from working at home makes it even more helpful.

photo: rappensuncle

Retirement Budget Calculator: CNN Money

Although not a ‘budgeting’ tool in that it doesn’t calculate what future expenses will be, it is effective in determining how much income you will have in your golden years so that you can properly budget in savings in the present.

GE Miller discusses personal finance topics for young professionals at 20somethingfinance.com.

photo: americans4financialreform

By now, you have probably filed the big Goldman Sachs controversy into the back of your mind, trumped by more current events (hello, Greek crisis and stock market craziness) that, you think, are of much bigger concern to you and your finances. 

Think again. The trouble at Wall Street royalty Goldman Sachs may have a huge impact on your finances – and not only if you happen to be a company shareholder. (And, as we’ll explain later, you may be a shareholder without realizing it.)

Before we try to explain the potential outcomes of the Goldman Sachs SEC fraud filings and criminal case, let’s take a look at how Goldman Sachs really makes their money. Then, we’ll go into who their shareholders are and what’s at stake. You may be surprised to find yourself on that list.

Goldman Sachs Is in the Business of…

Unless you work on Wall Street, chances are you think of Goldman as an investment banking company that manages investors’ assets. Yes, you’ve got the right idea. But that’s hardly the full picture.

Goldman recently reported first-quarter 2010 earnings of $3.46 billion on revenues of $12.78 billion. Here is the breakdown of their revenue streams:

* $1.184 billion from investment banking services, just $464 million of which was from financial advisory.

* $1.341 billion from Asset Management & Securities Services.

* $10.25 billion from trading and principal investments, $7.386 billion from FICC, or fixed income, currency, and commodities.

Basically, fees for investment banking and asset management services represent only about 10% of Goldman’s revenues. We’ll tell you what the rest is in a bit.

Meanwhile, take a minute to peruse the company’s “About” page. Be sure to enjoy the corporate mumbo-jumbo about “fuelling job creation and innovation” and “facilitating economic development.”

Then, make a mental note of this statement: “Whether a mid-size employer in Kansas, a large school district in California, a pension fund for skilled workers, or a start-up technology firm, our clients’ interests come first.”

Therein lies the key to the huge potential impact Goldman’s trouble’s could have on us, everyday people. Whether you work for a mid-size employer in Kansas, a large school district in California, a large company or start-up technology firm… chances are the health of your retirement funds may be tightly intertwined with that of Goldman Sachs.

Goldman’s Dilemma
Let’s go back to that last revenue stream, the $10.25 billion from trading and principal investments. This makes up almost 80% of Goldman’s revenues. In other words, the company makes money primarily by investing its own.

Goldman emphasizes on their site that their clients come first, but do they?

As you’ve probably heard, the whole Goldman fiasco revolves around the allegations that the company may have intentionally sold their clients mortgage-backed securities that were doomed to fail. More importantly, they did not disclose that while they were selling them these investments, they were betting against them. That’s a problem. A problem of trust.

As you can imagine, this cannot be good for a business that is charged with managing billions of other people’s money. Goldman’s stock (GS) gives a pretty clear picture of investors’ perceptions of the company: down from $184 a share on April 15 (the day before the SEC filed fraud charges) to $147 as the end of trading May 12. That’s a decline of 20%.

At this point, the outcome of the SEC case has a huge impact on its stock price. “Trading in or out of Goldman is a wager on the legal and political outcomes of their SEC case,” says Michael Wong, an equity analyst at market research firm Morningstar, who covers Goldman Sachs.

Does this affect you?

To state the obvious, most impacted by Goldman’s fate are its shareholders. Those include:

* Individual Shareholders: If you hold GS stock, you’ve lost 20% in less than a month.

* Institutional Investors: Goldman, a favorite of financial ETFs and mutual funds, is 74% institutionally owned. AXA, State Street, Wellington Management, Vanguard, Blackrock, and FMR collectively owned over $2 billion in Goldman shares as of December 31, 2009.

Other parties have a longer-term stake in the Goldman case:

* Politicians: The Democratic Party has been pushing for financial reform for a while now. The Goldman case gives them significant momentum to push their agenda forward before the 2010 general election.

* The SEC: The SEC has lost a lot of respect and clout after the financial crisis derailed the U.S. economy and many perceive them to no longer have the regulatory power that they once did. They are looking to make the case that they are still at the helm.

* Goldman’s Competitors (and their employees and shareholders): On the upside, Goldman has a premier list of clients and a leading position in a number of their niches. Their competitors have sufficient ammunition to discredit their ethical standards and woo clients away. On the downside, the Goldman case may create a flood of new financial regulations and retroactive investigations that could significantly influence how business is done on Wall Street.

* The American Taxpayers: Worst case for Goldman, they simply cannot repair the damaged reputation, lose their clientele, and fail as a business. “Goldman is definitely one of those institutions that could be considered ‘too big to fail,’” says Wong. “If that’s the case, their rescue could come at the expense of American taxpayers.”

* Home Buyers: Goldman is still in the business of trading mortgage securities. Should they become less of a player here, it may hurt market liquidity and make financing a mortgage even more of a challenge.

GE Miller blogs on professional personal finance issues for young professionals at 20somethingfinance.com.

photo: alancleaver_2000

There is no silver bullet when it comes to shopping for auto insurance. Each auto insurance company calculates their rates differently based on their risk calculations and profit margins. Which insurer ultimately offers you the best policy price will depend on dozens of different variables. You’re going to have to do your homework, make some calls, and periodically make even more calls.

The good news is there are a lot of great options out there to fit the different life stages and situations in which you may find yourself. Whenever you find yourself facing a big life change or at a certain milestone, calling your insurer — and shopping around with at least three or four more companies — is a good idea. You might find that the insurer who offered you the best rates a month ago is trumped by another company’s offer.

So when should you go shopping and what discounts should you seek? You’ll find that auto insurance premium discounts are very closely correlated to 12 typical milestones.

 (Note that these are not universal situations that lead to a premium discount with every insurer. That is why it pays to shop around.)

1. You buy a new car: One of the main factors determining your auto insurance premium is the vehicle itself — and its risk and safety ratings. State Farm publishes vehicle safety ratings and the corresponding vehicle safety discounts (VSD’s). The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) and MSN MoneyCentral have risk and safety ratings as well. Take them into consideration if you want to keep your insurance costs low.

2. Your credit has improved: Believe it or not, many insurers now look at your credit score when determining your rates. “Overall, the credit score has become a critical factor,” says Jonathon Tudor, a spokesman for InsWeb, which offers auto insurance quotes. “Simply put, the better your credit, the lower your rate will be.” Some states place restrictions on how insurance companies can use credit data to determine rates — most restrictive, not surprisingly, is California.

3. You have been a good driver over an extended period: Three or five years (depending on the insurer) after you are in a traffic accident or receive a traffic violation, it may fall off of your records with the insurer, lowering your premium.

4. You get older: Those turning 21 and then 25 will see discounts.

5. You get married: Many insurers factor your marriage status into their risk equations. Those who are married are viewed by some insurers as less risky, and worthy of a discount.

6. You graduate: You’ll find that many insurers offer discounts to alumni of certain universities. If you check with your universities alumni association, you should be able to find a list of these companies. Some insurers will offer a discount to anyone with a degree (less risky than those without one).

7. You move: Naturally, an auto insurance policy in Paris (Indiana) is going to be lower than one for the same person and car in New York City. With location comes more or less risk to insure.

8. Your miles driven decrease significantly: The more you are on the road, the higher risk you are. Some insurers, such as MileMeter.com are taking this a step further and piloting programs that track your actual mileage. You can find pay-per-mile auto insurance programs at GMAC and Progressive as well. “Generally these programs will make the most sense for drivers who have a very short commute or who have a second vehicle that they rarely drive,” Tudor says.

9. You get another policy: Insurers that cover other industries, including life, health, and home, often will offer a ‘multiple policy discount’ when you sign on for another policy with them.

10. You change jobs or industries: Insurers offer discounts to employees of certain companies and sometimes of entire industries. Makes sense, right? An engineer will likely be a lower risk than a taxi driver.

11. You add another vehicle to your policy: Most auto insurance companies offer discounts for multiple-vehicle policies, however, that discount amount varies by company, so it’s best to shop around.

12. You install a theft deterrent device: Vehicles with a theft deterrent device often get discounts, so if you add one, it pays to ask. Some examples of theft deterrent devices include visible wheel locks, an alarm system, VIN chemical etching, wheel locks, and electronic keys.

Now, Get the Quotes
Each time you encounter one of the changes listed above, it makes sense to start shopping around. Choose three to five different insurers, let them know exactly what you are looking for so that you can compare apples to apples, and get your quotes. May the most competitive insurer win!

GE Miller offers more personal finance tips for young professionals at 20somethingfinance.com.